(24 Dec 2023)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Southern Israel looking into northern Gaza - 24 December 2023
1. Various of plume of smoke rising and filling in the air
2. Smoke drifting in the air, drone flying overhead
STORYLINE:
A large tower of black smoke rose into the sky over the Gaza Strip on Sunday as Israel continued its airstrikes on the besieged enclave.
Israel declared war after Hamas gunmen stormed across the border on Oct. 7, killing some 1,200 people and taking some 240 hostages.
More than 20,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s war to destroy Hamas and more than 53,000 have been wounded, according to health officials in Gaza, a besieged territory ruled by the Islamic militant group for the past 16 years.
Israel blames Hamas for the high civilian death toll, citing the militants’ use of crowded residential areas and tunnels.
Israel has launched thousands of airstrikes since Oct. 7, and has largely refrained from commenting on specific attacks.
Fourteen Israeli soldiers were killed in combat in the Gaza Strip over the weekend, the Israeli military said Sunday, in some of the bloodiest days of battle since the start of the ground offensive and a sign that Hamas is still putting up a fight despite weeks of brutal war.
Israelis still stand firmly behind the country’s stated goals of crushing Hamas’ governing and military capabilities and releasing the remaining 129 captives.
That support has stayed mostly steady despite rising international pressure and the soaring death toll and unprecedented suffering among Palestinians.
Israel’s offensive has been one of the most devastating military campaigns in recent history, displacing nearly 85% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people and leveling wide swaths of the tiny coastal enclave.
AP video shot by Andrea Rosa
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